The high level of songcraft, Saloman's devotion to his sound, and the fierce performances on White Numbers show that anyone who thought maybe the Bevis Frond were past their prime was just dead wrong, and this is a welcome addition to their catalog.

Rzeznik and Takac are merely sticking with the program that they helped to create, but they have honed their sound so close to the corporate bone that the marrow is beginning to show, and if they're not careful, there soon may be nothing left to feed the masses with.

While Long Enough to Leave may lack some of the punch and energy of previous releases, it shows The Mantles developing their own sound and the record grows more and more powerful with each play.

All four members of this indie supergroup make Overseas unique, but at its highest heights, the Kadane brothers make the band great.

While even those fond of the '90s revival may be close to overdosing on nostalgia, Empire offers a fresh enough take to make it worth a listen.

Even at their most psychedelic on Golden Age, Grandchildren remain a memorably melodic, utterly listenable band.

While they're still enjoyable--they're talented craftsman with an innate ear for pleasing pop hooks--the insistence on making everything bigger and bolder than previously turns Anthem a little wearying over the long haul, but when sampled in small doses the trio remains a reliable pop pleasure.

The album quickly stabilizes with satisfying, if mostly unexciting, material. Other than the lack of European dance-pop, the main difference between this set and Here I Am is the presence of Rowland's most revealing and powerful song, "Dirty Laundry."

Unlike Dali's separate delivery of the two, Yeezus is an extravagant stunt with the high-art packed in, offering an eccentric, audacious, and gripping experience that's vital and truly unlike anything else.

Yessir Whatever suffers from being disjointed and a bit too much like a sketchbook, but the album is pulled together from 12 years of archival recordings, some of them previously released on rare comps and out-of-print vinyl.

Norrvide strips the project to its barest essentials and allows listeners a chance to really hear the perpetually uneasy emotions at its core.

Few things are more excruciating than hearing shallow frat guys try to sound deep, and these tracks can really make you wince. Ultimately though, when 3OH!3 stick to the anthemic, glorification/satirization of their own lifestyle, the good certainly outweighs the bad on Omens.

Best to ignore these two misfits [ballads "Sob Story" and "In a Bad Way"] and think of all the finely played and sung modern guitar pop that surrounds them. Because that stuff will make fans of Prefab Sprout, Orange Juice, and all the bands who have stolen from them through the years very happy and satisfied indeed.

Melt Yourself Down is an exhilarating debut from a group whose members know each other well enough to head into this kind of wild territory with nothing holding them back.

Despite the fact that this is the fifth album completed in six years, Statik Selektah's Extended Play doesn't seem sloppily thrown together. Instead, it's a dense, imaginative outing that pays tribute to classic East Coast hip-hop lovingly.

Fossils is not only an auspicious debut, but one that lives up to, and at times even exceeds, the promise of its potential.

Ultimately, Bounty was made to create mystique and interest, and it still does that even after Iamamiwhoami's secret wasn't one anymore.

Without the hooks or the lofty lyrics, the album seems made exclusively for Miller's fans or those who right-click indie rap mixtape links on the daily. Those audiences should find it an interesting trip, admirable artistic growth, and an attractive, entertaining step in the right direction. Others will likely be flummoxed.

Whether dealing out breakbeat punishments like "777," wriggling dubstep like "Ascension," or mystical funk like "Isis," he sounds like no one else, simultaneously street and chic, enticing and elusive.

Austra opts for a more balanced and poised version of the sound they set forth on Feel It Break; even though that album's rough edges and raw nerves were a large part of what made it so potent, Olympia feels like the beginning of a more sustainable, and versatile, direction for the band.

It is one of those odd Primal Scream albums where they pull it all together--roping in the hard rock, free jazz, club beats, flowery psychedelia, the worship of the Stooges, and a devotion to avant-garde cinema--building upon the past in an attempt to get closer to the future.

The guys in Empire of the Sun manage to not only catch the lightning again, but their skill at crafting perfect pop, the depth in their songs, and the emotion their voices transmit make this record better than one might have ever expected. Modern pop doesn't get any better than this.

"Crooked Smile" with special guests TLC is a genuine, mature step in the right direction and will have no trouble reaching vintage age. A handful of other numbers carry that same weight, making Born Sinner a daring step forward for Cole and an exciting attempt at mastering Jay's Blueprint style.

Remarkably, Turbines makes the right choices at almost every turn, never meandering or spending too much time indulging one idea but instead leaving just enough unsaid to keep drawing the listener back.

It's always fun to see where Smith's muse will take him next, but this kind of simple and true album is where he is at his best.

Getting Closer comes off as an undecided jumble of background and foreground music. Nice, but not necessary, this one falls somewhere between a promising debut and glossy, pretty wallpaper.

The songs on This River are tighter and more deftly written than on previous offerings, but the more immediate, in-the-moment-of-creation production and incendiary performances keep things from getting slick.

While the most aggressive electronic moments are also the weakest songs here, the merging of whispery pop and fully engaged electronic production is a huge success for a band whose output has been sleepier in the past, and points toward even more exciting developments in the future.

Super Collider is so mired in midtempo drudgery and familiar hard rock (not thrash) tropes that it never really connects.

Just as the music on Damage is a sophisticated, fully realized version of the urgent, rambunctious rock Jimmy Eat World played early their career, the lyrics are more sophisticated as well.

If it is uneven, that's because there's much more here than is necessary, rather than a sad dearth of ideas.

At its best, Danish & Blue finds Amos and Hall taking their sound in playful, unexpected directions with growing finesse.

The plethora of unlikely choices adds a depth and tension to the songs, recalling a variety of unique reference points while creating the album's own remarkably strange, remarkably honest statement.

Black Dog Barking is like a safe haven for hard rock purists, offering up a safe place for people to wear jean jackets and pump their fists without irony or judgment.

Always moving at full speed, YPLL creates a sense of anxious tension that, were it a longer album, would be exhausting.

It is, quite frankly, Isbell's best solo album thus far.

Whenever they seem affected it's when they try to be a little bit too pure in their bluegrass ("Hermitage Hostep"), but when they incorporate bits of rock & roll and gospel, or when they cut loose ("People Been Talking"), or lay back ("Just Like You"), they're a compelling, muscled Americana outfit, given just the right showcase here by Benson.

Most impressive about The Wack Album is that The Lonely Island manage to get their jokes across without feeling like they're making fun of rap which, given how much material they'd have by making fun of themselves, would really be a last resort.

If you're a free agent in the market for a band that delivers some serious melodic death metal without feeling the need to take itself too seriously, Halo of Blood is an album that you should definitely check out.

Another sublime chapter in this group's recorded legacy.

Kveikur isn't the kind of post-rock album that you throw on to listen to as you contemplate the changing of the leaves, but rather an album that explores the differences between the comforts of the day and the anxieties of the night, blending the bright and the brooding to create something bold and beautiful.

The debut is the one with the hits that draw you into her dark mood, while DVA is the sludgy one you sink into and wallow in for a while.

Considering all the shrewd alliances and its polished attack, Settle seems like it was designed to be 2013's acceptable dance album. That said, any purist who denies its pleasures is a crank.

Both [Tape One and Tape Two] are uniquely imaginative and scattered, and with this one, it becomes wholly apparent that Young Fathers have carved out their own distinct style.

Her partnership with Sigsworth is a fine, even seamless fit, making this consistent, and satisfying, top to bottom.

Despite its short 31-minute duration, Four (Acts of Love) is a weighty, thought-provoking, moving experience.

The consistent excellence of Tomorrow's Harvest is as comforting as a collection of quietly menacing android fever dreams like these could possibly be.

This kind of loopy, poetic imagery is carried throughout all of Planta, and helps make it one of CSS's most creatively fertile and enjoyable pop organisms to date.

While Half of Where You Live is a slightly more streamlined electronic album than his debut, it still manages to be a transporting work that is easy to enjoy as a hip, calming background mood piece, and stands as a nice, fitting addition to the Ghostly International catalog.

The more the band embraces Pythons' slickness, the better it sounds; it's a pleasant, ingratiating set of songs that don't aim to be anything more than that.

The influence of early Sabbath has become so omnipresent that it's come back to influence its very creators 40 years later, but the results are unexpectedly brilliant, apocalyptic, and essential for any die-hard metal fan.

This perfectionism, present in the sonics and in the complex arrangements, makes Field of Reeds the most challenging title in their catalog and also the most groundbreaking.

The 14 barebones blasts that make up the record serve not just as a testament to the group's legendary status, but a reminder of the ageless spirit of rock & roll at its most fundamental level.

Think of it as a conceptual street release made for Styles and/or Scram fans and Float succeeds splendidly.

It's difficult to say how good this musical is just from the songs and pieces of dialogue presented here, but the songs have a weary, inevitable flow to them, as if fate forced them into a dark room with little light or air or chance of redemption.

It may not be Rogue Wave's best record, since Out of the Shadows still holds that honor, but it is the record that is the best at showing all the sides of Rogue the songwriter and Rogue Wave the band, and for that it is well worth checking out.

Few songwriters can capture the bleak comedy of loneliness, bitterness, and the sheer helplessness that accompanies aging than Merritt, and he does so here with great aplomb.

Evil Friends offers ample evidence that the match between Portugal. The Man and Burton expanded the horizons of both parties and will likely heighten the band's profile considerably.

While Coco and Hannibal are doing it a little less softly now, they're still killing 'em.

Here it results in some of their best and most confident work to date.

Even if the album is more comforting than exciting, it's still an enjoyable portrait of Friedberger's artistry: warm, genuine and a little mischievous.

With Selfhood, Sharks have come into their own as a band, one that’s grown past the simple sturm und drang of punk's three-chord limitations and emerged as something even more inspiring.

If you're a fan of autumnal pop that wears its heart on its sleeve as it shouts its feelings out to anyone who will listen and you're not a fan of these guys, The Greatest Generation is here to realign your priorities for you.

The by-the-numbers production goes hand in hand with the bandmembers' tailored playing and thickly stylized vocals, hitting all the marks of emphatic country-enamored rock on tracks like the Toupin-fronted "Houston Train," a tale of being strung out, riding the hard-luck rails.

While these few songs ["Losing a Friend" and "That Girl, That Scene"] threaten to derail the album, the rest of the set is more unified, offering an understated but brilliant celebration of both Frankie & the Heartstrings' unique songwriting and their catalog of classic pop influences.

Even if it doesn't always demand listeners' attention, Immunity is never less than thoughtfully crafted.

If the album isn't quite a classic, it does represent its time in an unhurried, unselfconscious way: this is what big-budget rock sounded like in the mid-'70s, and expanding it to such an extravagant size doesn't hurt it because it always was bigger and bolder than its competitors.

Package it all together in an album that's sensibly sized and runs smooth as silk, and the evolving and growing Mount Kimbie remain a keeper.

Overall, these songs are a fine reintroduction to a band that has worked hard to emphasize its strengths and come up with new ones.

As this excellent introductory comp proves, no matter which sonic path he chooses here, or will choose in the future, Furlow's songcraft and skill at coming up with hummable, strummable songs will serve him well and make fans of pop music with a little grit and gunk quite happy.

The density of the album might take a while to sink into, but its catchiness will keep the listener returning to try to crack the code.

The 11 songs breeze by quickly, cultivating a mood so generous and warm that listening to the album feels like a friend smiling and waving from across the room at the first party of the summer.

Other Life, while being a solid album, falls short of being any type of definitive statement about his place in the landscape of his scene or the world at large.

Alice in Chains are now firmly entrenched in their middle age and settling into what they do best: retaining their signature without pandering and, tellingly, without succumbing to the darkness that otherwise defines them.

Eisley rarely come off as cloying, and while Currents may require a little more patience from the listener than on previous outings, it's well worth the investment.

Homme has marshaled all of his strengths on ...Like Clockwork and has found a way forward, a way to deepen his music without compromising his identity.

Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and White Denim's D are examples of similar-sounding albums that successfully pushed the respective bands outside their comfort zones, and Saltwater takes Brazos to a new plateau in the same way.

Considering the Black Dog's immense volume of output over the previous few years, it's remarkable that the group's attention to detail and uniquely stern sound remains. And yet, for all the output that preceded it, Tranklements isn't merely another Black Dog album.

These songs also reflect how When Saints Go Machine have expanded and enriched their sound on Infinity Pool even more than Konkylie might have suggested.

Ultraviolet represents a further refinement of the new direction they've been heading in, making it not only the bands most accessible work to date, but also their most purposefully written and solidly constructed, putting it in the running for the best album of their career.

He's never been one for lyrical subtlety, but this set contains several stretches of monotonous, joyless carnality.

It may have taken Boyer a long time to take flight, but on Clarietta he soars.

The band's mastery of various styles, moods, and sounds here is impressive, and while it bodes well for future albums, it also means that Hooded Fang have arrived as one of the most exciting indie rock/pop bands around in 2013.

Abandon is an exercise in precision, drawing in its prey and exposing it to a sonic assault that will leave it both exhausted and enlightened.

Tales of a GrassWidow may not be as overtly challenging as Grey Oceans, but it offers some of CocoRosie's most focused, accomplished songs yet.

A headlong dive into the uncomfortable territory where vital art is made, this album takes all of Baths' skills to a new level.

Tricky seems to be doing some soul-searching--but the running time is long, and at least three quarters of the album is top-shelf.

All of this is enjoyable but it's rarely compelling, as very few songs play with the original arrangement in any serious fashion.

Slow Summits is an unhurried, understated masterpiece that should make fans of the band, and of music in general, glad that the Pastels have not only stuck with it for so long, but grown into the kind of group that could release something this warm and beautiful.

Marling is an old soul through and through, and her remarkably timeless voice, idiosyncratic lyrics, and increasingly impressive guitar chops help to elevate the album's less immediate moments, and while some may argue that her increasingly Americanized, Pacific coast folk-pop can feel a little like fan fiction, it doesn't make it any less enjoyable to sink your toes into.

Clearly hyper-detailed and considered with the utmost patience, the album still feels spontaneous and more than anything captures a stark honesty that makes every song glow. It's a brilliant return.

Despite the obvious--and deliberate--reference points, most of Howl is a solid chapter in the evolution of a fascinating band.

When producers like Mr. Green, Apathy, and Buckwild come up with fresh, funky ideas, R.A. responds with excellence, and sometimes a J-Zone-sized sense of humor.

With No Answer, the band rises to the standards in anti-music set by its own discography.

Probably because neither of the artists concentrate on their usual instruments of choice, there is a childlike innocence that runs throughout the wash.

While Live with the Britten Sinfonia may be too formal to provide the wild, free-ranging ride that one might expect from this adventurous lot, it is dazzling in its own right and in almost all the right ways.

This is an interesting album, one that will reward repeated listening, but one can't help but think that it's a transitional album, and that Dead Confederate are building to something even bigger and more balanced down the road.

Quite a few people are doing this kind of music in 2013; precious few are doing it this well.